For all Royal Opera House press releases visit www.roh.org.uk/for/press-and-media Tuesday 14 May 2019 Royal Opera House announces 17 new productions for its 2019/20 Season • The Royal Ballet and The Royal Opera present seventeen new productions including six world premieres. • The Royal Opera House celebrates 24 exciting co-productions, co-commissions and partnerships. • Director of Opera for The Royal Opera Oliver Mears unveils new Handel and Britten productions, alongside operas designed specifically for family audiences. • Director of The Royal Ballet Kevin O’Hare announces a Season that draws on The Royal Ballet’s rich cultural heritage while embracing dynamic and contemporary new work. • The Royal Opera House reveals a suite of new work in Doncaster, collaborating with every school in the area. The Royal Ballet will also tour to the city in Summer 2020 for the first time in its history. • With almost 700,000 people visiting the ROH since September, more than a quarter of a million visiting during non-performance times and almost 28,000 of those participating in free and ticketed daytime events, the Royal Opera House extends its programme of activities, events and festivals for people of all ages in 2019/20. The Royal Opera House today launches its 2019/20 Season, unveiling an exciting range of new commissions, world premieres and much-loved revivals, supported by a diverse range of ticketed and free daytime events, activities and festivals for people of all ages.
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Royal Opera House announces 17 new productions for its ......including six world premieres. • The Royal Opera House celebrates 24 exciting co-productions, co-commissions and partnerships.
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For all Royal Opera House press releases visit
www.roh.org.uk/for/press-and-media
Tuesday 14 May 2019
Royal Opera House announces 17 new productions for its
2019/20 Season
• The Royal Ballet and The Royal Opera present seventeen new productions
including six world premieres.
• The Royal Opera House celebrates 24 exciting co-productions,
co-commissions and partnerships.
• Director of Opera for The Royal Opera Oliver Mears unveils new Handel and
Britten productions, alongside operas designed specifically for family
audiences.
• Director of The Royal Ballet Kevin O’Hare announces a Season that draws on
The Royal Ballet’s rich cultural heritage while embracing dynamic and
contemporary new work.
• The Royal Opera House reveals a suite of new work in Doncaster, collaborating
with every school in the area. The Royal Ballet will also tour to the city in
Summer 2020 for the first time in its history.
• With almost 700,000 people visiting the ROH since September, more than a
quarter of a million visiting during non-performance times and almost
28,000 of those participating in free and ticketed daytime events, the Royal
Opera House extends its programme of activities, events and festivals for
people of all ages in 2019/20.
The Royal Opera House today launches its 2019/20 Season, unveiling an exciting
range of new commissions, world premieres and much-loved revivals, supported by a
diverse range of ticketed and free daytime events, activities and festivals for people
In the first full Season since the completion of the Royal Opera House’s three-year
Open Up renovation, The Royal Opera Company unveils a host of innovative new work,
with 13 new productions, including two world premieres, in the Season ahead.
Building on the success of 2019’s Berenice, Director of Opera Oliver Mears brings more
Handel to the Company’s repertory with Barrie Kosky’s new production of Agrippina.
Handel performances continue with the Jette Parker Young Artists, who take centre-
stage in a brand-new production of Susanna, performed in the West End’s newest and
most intimate space, the Linbury Theatre.
The Company continues to build on the success of Billy Budd by staging two Britten
masterpieces. David McVicar directs a new production of Britten’s last opera Death in
Venice, and Natalie Abrahami and Michael Levine stage a new production of one of
the composer’s best-loved operas, The Turn of the Screw, in the Linbury Theatre.
The Royal Opera also unveils a programme of work specifically designed for family
audiences, including Antony McDonald’s new production of Gerald Barry’s wild and
witty Alice’s Adventures Under Ground, and a world premiere: composer Jules
Maxwell’s adaptation of Shaun Tan’s The Lost Thing, directed by Ben Wright. Staged
with Candoco Dance Company, this ground-breaking new commission will feature a
cast of disabled and non-disabled singers, dancers and musicians.
Building on the huge success of Olivier award winning Kát’a Kabanová, The Royal
Opera stages the third opera in its Leoš Janáček cycle, Jenůfa, directed by Claus Guth
with a stellar cast that includes Asmik Grigorian, who makes her Royal Opera debut
in the title role, and Karita Mattila as Kostelnička.
In a co-commission between the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and The Royal
Opera, composer Matt Rogers and librettist Sally O’Reilly bring the world premiere of
She Described It To Death to the Linbury stage.
The Jette Parker Young Artists Programme welcomes five new singers and one stage
director onto the Programme for the 2019/20 Season: their work will showcase world-
class talent at its best, both in the Linbury Theatre and on the main stage.
The Royal Ballet draws on its rich cultural heritage while embracing the diverse and
contemporary in its 2019/20 Season. The Company unveils five new productions,
including four world premieres and co-productions. The Company will celebrate
international partnerships and award-winning artists and companies from across the
globe.
Alongside classics such as Manon, The Sleeping Beauty and Liam Scarlett’s critically-
acclaimed production of Swan Lake, The Royal Ballet joins forces with Birmingham
Royal Ballet in a Heritage programme capturing the unique history of the Company
and the extraordinary choreographic creativity of Ninette de Valois, Frederick Ashton
and Kenneth MacMillan. The Royal Ballet also partners with CCN Ballet de Lorraine to
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mark the Merce Cunningham centennial in a production of Cross Currents, which will
see three dancers from The Royal Ballet join forces with dancers from Paris Opera
Ballet and Royal Ballet Flanders in the first visit to Paris in 15 years. The Company is
also looking forward to the long-awaited return of repertory classic Coppélia at
Christmas, in its first staging by The Royal Ballet for more than a decade.
The Royal Ballet celebrates the contemporary with four world premieres, including
new commissions from Liam Scarlett, Cathy Marston and Pam Tanowitz, who makes
her Royal Opera House debut. Wayne McGregor presents the world premiere of The
Dante Project in collaboration with Thomas Adès, Tacita Dean, Lucy Carter and Uzma
Hameed.
The new Linbury Theatre provides a world-class stage for The Royal Ballet and a host
of pioneering national and international artistic companies. Female choreographers
lead the programme, with new work from Pam Tanowitz, Morgann Runacre-Temple
and Sharon Eyal. Mlindi Kulashe makes his choreographic debut with Northern Ballet,
and Carlos Acosta’s company Acosta Danza performs new, Cuban-inspired work
perfectly suited to the state-of-the-art Linbury Theatre. In a co-production between
The Royal Ballet, Rambert and BBC Films, Rambert also perform the world premiere
of Aisha and Abhaya, a modern fairy tale with choreography by Sharon Eyal.
The Royal Opera House’s programme of free and ticketed daytime festivals, activities
and events encompasses almost 200 separate events over the course of the next
Season, and will include free lunchtime performances, the continuation of its popular
Opera and Ballet Dots programme (for children aged three months to five years) as
well as 11 Family Sundays, which welcome diverse new audiences to our art forms.
The Royal Opera House’s national learning programme, which has engaged more than
35,000 students, 531 schools and 1,255 teachers across the country so far this
Season, has bold ambitions for 2019/20. The Royal Opera House will partner with
Doncaster through ‘Doncaster Creates’ (Doncaster’s Culture Development
programme), Cast (Doncaster’s £22m performance venue) and Doncaster
Metropolitan Borough Council. Through the ROH National Learning Programme, the
Royal Opera House will work with every school in Doncaster over three years, staging
a mass community engagement performance in summer 2020. Alongside this, The
Royal Ballet will perform in a gala in Doncaster, and the ROH’s popular Chance to
Dance talent development programme will also continue.
Cinema highlights from the 19/20 Royal Opera House season include: The Royal
Ballet’s Coppélia, The Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake, and opera broadcasts featuring
world-renowned opera stars such as Jonas Kaufmann (in Fidelio), Bryn Terfel (in Don
Pasquale) and Nina Stemme (in Elektra). Free culture returns to communities across
the country, from Aberdeen to the Isle of Wight as through our BP Big Screens we
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share three world class productions free of charge in 19/20. Full details and titles to
be announced later this year.
Opera and ballet for the 2019/20 Season
Don Giovanni
The Royal Opera
Co-production with Israeli Opera, Gran Teatre del Liceu, Barcelona, and Houston
Grand Opera
Music: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Libretto: Lorenzo da Ponte
Sexual intrigue, jealousy, wit, anger… and retribution! The new Royal Opera Season begins with Mozart’s engaging masterpiece, which follows Don Giovanni, the women he serially seduces, and the vengeance that finally catches up with him. The opera is renowned for its ever-shifting portrayals of complex characters, fast-moving action and mix of the comic and the heartfelt. A cast of international singers – both familiar and making Royal Opera debuts – under conductor Hartmut Haenchen perform the glorious arias and ensembles of this opera favourite.
Creative team
• Conductor: Hartmut Haenchen • Director: Kasper Holten • Set designer: Es Devlin • Video designer: Luke Halls • Costume designer: Anja Vang Kragh • Lighting designer: Bruno Poet • Choreographer: Signe Fabricius • Fight Director: Kate Waters
Cast
• Don Giovanni: Erwin Schrott
• Leporello: Roberto Tagliavini
• Donna Anna: Malin Byström
• Donna Elvira: Christine Rice
• Don Ottavio: Daniel Behle, Emanuele D’Aguanno
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• Zerlina: Louise Alder
• Commendatore: Lars Woldt
• Masetto: Leon Košavić
Royal Opera Chorus
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Performances 16 September–10 October 2019 Main Stage Live cinema relay Tuesday 8 October 2019 Sung in Italian with English surtitles
Werther
The Royal Opera Production owned by Opéra national de Paris
Music: Jules Massenet Libretto: Édouard Blau and Paul Milliet
Generous philanthropic support from Mrs Aline Foriel-Destezet (Production Principal), Professor Paul Cartledge and Judith Portrait OBE Juan Diego Flórez and Isabel Leonard lead the cast in Massenet’s operatic version of The Sorrows of Young Werther, the classic by Goethe that helped define the Romantic age. This is a story of obsession and passion that begins quietly, but drives relentlessly on to a shattering conclusion. The naturalistic production by Benoît Jacquot is redolent of the story’s mid-19th-century origins, but the human emotions portrayed are timeless. The music – wonderfully melodic, richly scored and atmospheric – is conducted by Edward Gardner.
Creative team
• Conductor: Edward Gardner • Director: Benoît Jacquot • Set designer: Charles Edwards • Costume designer: Christian Gasc • Lighting designer: Charles Edwards
Cast includes
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• Werther: Juan Diego Flórez • Charlotte: Isabel Leonard • Albert: Jacques Imbrailo • Sophie: Heather Engebretson
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Performances 17 September–5 October 2019 Main Stage Sung in French with English surtitles
Agrippina
New to The Royal Opera
Co-production with Bavarian State Opera, Munich, and Dutch National Opera
Music: George Frideric Handel
Libretto: Vincenzo Grimani
Generous philanthropic support from Mrs Aline Foriel-Destezet (Production Principal) and Charles Holloway
Agrippina is the ultimate political operator – outrageous and blatant in her pursuit of
power. In the title role, Joyce DiDonato heads a specialist cast in Handel’s early
operatic success, a calling card when he moved to London. The score boasts a
succession of brilliant Baroque jewels: one after another come the bright, sparkling
arias, here performed by a cast also including acclaimed British singers Iestyn
Davies and Lucy Crowe and directed with characteristic invention by Barrie Kosky.
• Costume designer: Klaus Bruns • Lighting designer: Joachim Klein • Dramaturg: Nikolaus Stenitzer
Cast
• Agrippina: Joyce DiDonato
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• Nerone: Franco Fagioli
• Poppea: Lucy Crowe • Ottone: Iestyn Davies
• Claudio: Gianluca Buratto • Pallante: Andrea Mastroni • Narciso: Eric Jurenas
• Lesbo: José Coca Loza
Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment
Performances
23 September–11 October 2019 Main Stage Sung in Italian with English surtitles The Intelligence Park New production, The Royal Opera Co-production with Music Theatre Wales; in association with London Sinfonietta
Music: Gerald Barry Libretto: Vincent Deane
Gerald Barry creates operas like no other – brilliant, surreal and often laugh-out-loud funny. Not seen in London since 1990, Barry’s first opera The Intelligence Park
comes to the Linbury ahead of Alice’s Adventures Under Ground on the Main Stage later in the Season. The setting is Dublin in 1753, where a composer’s work on an opera is disrupted and intensified when he falls in love with the lead castrato, who at
the same time elopes with the composer’s fiancée, causing fantasy and reality to collide. The music, scored for chamber orchestra and conducted here by Jessica Cottis, is startling in every aspect of its range, making extravagant virtuoso
demands of the six performers. Creative team
• Conductor: Jessica Cottis • Director and designer: Nigel Lowery
Cast
• Robert Paradies: Michel de Souza • D’Esperaudieu: Adrian Dwyer • Sir Joshua Cramer: Stephen Richardson • Jerusha Cramer: Rhian Lois
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• Serafino: Patrick Terry (Jette Parker Young Artist) • Faranesi: Stephanie Marshall
Production made in association with London Sinfonietta Performances
25 September–4 October 2019 Linbury Theatre
Sung in English
Manon The Royal Ballet
Generous philanthropic support from the Jean Sainsbury Royal Opera House Fund, Marina Hobson OBE, John and Susan Burns and Kenneth and Susan Green.
Choreography: Kenneth MacMillan
Music: Jules Massenet
To begin the new Royal Ballet Season, a wealth of talent from the whole Company is on stage for MacMillan’s modern classic. This interpretation pulls no punches as it follows the journey of the original good ‘bad’ girl of the title and her young lover through a world of 18th-century opulence and its dark underside. The detailed settings and rich characterizations have ensured that Manon has become an enduring favourite of the repertory of the Company and indeed the world. Grand, louche, heartrending – the temptations and torments of love, from depravity to ecstasy, propel a gripping, emotional and beautifully choreographed ballet.
Creative team
• Orchestrated by: Martin Yates • Originally compiled by: Leighton Lucas with the collaboration of Hilda Gaunt
Designer: Nicholas Georgiadis • Lighting designer: Jacopo Pantani • Conductors: Koen Kessels, Paul Murphy
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Performances:
2 October-6 November 2019
Main stage
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Cross Currents/Monotones II/New Pam Tanowitz
The Royal Ballet
Merce Cunningham Centennial The centenary of the birth of Merce Cunningham is an occasion to celebrate the
extraordinary legacy of this pioneering American choreographer. He reshaped the relationship between body, movement and music, melding the classical and the innovative to explore the essence of human motion. In the first of two celebratory
programmes, The Royal Ballet performs Cunningham’s Cross Currents – a trio first seen in London in 1964 – and Frederick Ashton’s Cunningham-indebted Monotones II. This short, intimate programme is completed with a new commissioned work
from American choreographer Pam Tanowitz, whose modern approach from a classical base continues the fusions and explorations that Cunningham’s work exemplifies.
Monotones II • Choreography: Frederick Ashton • Music: Erik Satie
• Designer: Frederick Ashton • Lighting designer: John B. Read
New Pam Tanowitz (world premiere) • Choreography: Pam Tanowitz • Lighting designer: Clifton Taylor
Performances:
10–11 October 2019 Linbury Theatre
Dance Umbrella: The Future Bursts In Part of Dance Umbrella 2019 and FranceDance UK
Two international companies present a second Linbury programme to mark the
Merce Cunningham Centennial. Amala Dianor performs Somewhere in the Middle of Infinity, in which three dancers test borders and boundaries as hip hop, African and
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contemporary dance clash with creative force. CCN – Ballet de Lorraine performs
two works. For Four Walls explores the fluid interactions between past and present, taking inspiration from a 1944 collaboration between Cunningham and composer
John Cage. Cunningham’s Sounddance (1975) completes the programme with an ‘organized chaos’ and frenetic energy that challenges concepts of symmetry and conformity in the idea of ballet itself.
Somewhere in the Middle of Infinity
• Choreography: Amala Dianor • Music: Awir Leon • Lighting designer: Fabien Lamri
• Video designers: Olivier Gilquin and Constance Joliff
For Four Walls
• Choreography: Petter Jacobsson and Thomas Caley • Music: John Cage • Set designers: Petter Jacobsson and Thomas Caley
• Costume designers: Petter Jacobsson and Thomas Caley with Martine Augsbourger and Annabelle Saintier
• Lighting designer: Eric Wurtz
Sounddance
• Choreography: Merce Cunningham • Music: David Tudor • Designer and lighting designer: Mark Lancaster
• Staging: Meg Harper and Thomas Caley Performances:
24–26 October 2019 Linbury Theatre
Don Pasquale New to The Royal Opera
Co-production with Opéra national de Paris and Teatro Massimo, Palermo
Music: Gaetano Donizetti Libretto: Giovanni Ruffini and Gaetano Donizetti
Generous philanthropic support from the Friends of Covent Garden
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Royal Opera favourite Bryn Terfel heads the cast for this new production of Donizetti’s comedy of domestic drama across two generations. The witty story
of a middle-aged man whose supposed young wife runs rings around him – with her own ulterior romantic purpose in mind – has long delighted and surprised audiences, not least as presented with the sparkle of its music and the virtuoso skill of its
performers. Damiano Michieletto’s exhilarating production shows how contemporary the characters still are and how immediate and touching the story remains.
Creative team • Conductor: Evelino Pidò • Director: Damiano Michieletto • Set designer: Paolo Fantin • Costume designer: Agostino Cavalca • Lighting designer: Alessandro Carletti • Video designer: rocafilm
Cast
• Don Pasquale: Bryn Terfel • Norina: Olga Peretyatko • Ernesto: Ioan Hotea • Malatesta: Mariusz Kwiecień
Performances:
14 October–2 November 2019 Main Stage Live cinema relay: Thursday 24 October 2019
Sung in Italian with English surtitles Zauberland (Magic Land)
An encounter with Schumann’s Dichterliebe New to The Royal Opera
C.I.C.T. – Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord co-commission and co-production with La Monnaie/De Munt, Brussels; Opéra de Lille; Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts,
Inc., New York; Opéra de Rouen Normandie; University Musical Society of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; and Le Cercle des Partenaires des Bouffes du
Nord With the support of Lyrical Creation Fund (SACD)
Music: Robert Schumann and Bernard Foccroulle Text: Heinrich Heine and Martin Crimp
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As the Middle East blazes with conflict, a young woman waits at a European border,
hoping to cross over to Zauberland – a magic land of peace and security. But when she falls asleep, she dreams of the burnt-out city she has been forced to leave
behind. The Royal Opera’s relationship with director Katie Mitchell and writer Martin Crimp (Written on Skin and Lessons in Love and Violence) moves to the Linbury Theatre with a new dramatic piece for soprano, piano and four actors. Crimp and
composer Bernard Foccroulle have created 16 new songs that are performed alongside Robert Schumann and Heinrich Heine’s Dichterliebe, opening up a dialogue between the 19th century and today.
Creative team • Director: Katie Mitchell • Set and costume designer: Chloe Lamford
• Lighting designer: James Farncombe Cast
• Julia Bullock (soprano) • Cédric Tiberghien (piano) • Ben Clifford, Natasha Kafka, David Rawlins, Raphael Zeri (actors)
Performances: 15–18 October 2019
Linbury Theatre Sung in German and English with English surtitles
Concerto/Enigma Variations/Raymonda Act III The Royal Ballet
Generous philanthropic support from The Royal Opera House Endowment Fund Enigma Variations – Generous philanthropic support from Lindsay and
Sarah Tomlinson Conductor: Pavel Sorokin
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House From The Royal Ballet’s classical origins in the works of Petipa, to the home-grown
choreographers who put British ballet on the world stage, this mixed programme highlights the versatility of the Company. Petipa’s Raymonda Act III is Russian classical ballet summarized in one act, full of sparkle and precise technique, while
Ashton’s Enigma Variations is quintessentially British in every way – from its score by Elgar and period designs by Julia Trevelyan Oman, to Ashton’s signature style, the essence of British ballet. Concerto, MacMillan’s fusion of classical technique with
a contemporary mind, completes a programme that shows the breadth of the Company’s heritage.
• Music: Frank Moon, Jack Edmonds, Max Richter after Vivaldi
• Costume designer: Kimie Nakano
• Lighting designer: Alastair West
• Co-lighting designer (The Shape of Sound): Kenneth Tindall
Performances:
5–7 November 2019
Linbury Theatre
Little Red Riding Hood
Northern Ballet dancer Mariana Rodrigues creates a short new work on a classic fairytale, especially for children. Little Red Riding Hood is a kind and thoughtful little girl who loves her family. One day, on a visit to her grandmother, she meets a very hungry wolf in the forest who just wants something to eat. But is he really such a big, bad wolf? Join Little Red on her adventure as she makes friends and discovers the importance of kindness. Loved by audiences in the theatre and through a string of hugely successful CBeebies TV adaptations (including Three Little Pigs), this is a treat not to be missed.
Creative team
• Choreography: Mariana Rodrigues
• Music: Eloise Gynn
• Designer: Marjoke Henrichs
Performances:
8–10 November 2019
Linbury Theatre
The Sleeping Beauty
The Royal Ballet
Choreography: Marius Petipa
Music: Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky
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Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Generous philanthropic support from Kenneth and Susan Green and The Royal
Opera House Endowment Fund
Original production (2006) made possible by the Linbury Trust, Simon and Virginia
Robertson and Marina Hobson OBE
This production of The Sleeping Beauty has been delighting audiences in Covent
Garden since 1946. A classic of Russian ballet, it established The Royal Ballet both in
its new home after World War II and as a world-class company. Sixty years later, in
2006, the original staging was revived, returning Oliver Messel’s wonderful designs
and glittering costumes to the stage. Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky’s enchanting score
and Marius Petipa’s original choreography beautifully combine with sections created
for The Royal Ballet by Frederick Ashton, Anthony Dowell and Christopher Wheeldon.
This ballet is sure to cast its spell over anyone who sees it.
Creative team:
• Additional choreography: Frederick Ashton, Anthony Dowell,
Christopher Wheeldon
• Production: Monica Mason and Christopher Newton after Ninette de Valois and
Nicholas Sergeyev
• Original designers: Oliver Messel
• Additional designs: Peter Farmer
• Lighting designer: Mark Jonathan
• Conductors: Simon Hewett, Tom Seligman
Performances:
7 November 2019–16 January 2020
Main Stage
Live cinema relay: Tuesday 16 January
Death in Venice
New production, The Royal Opera
Co-production with Volksoper Wien
Music: Benjamin Britten
Libretto: Myfanwy Piper
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Generous philanthropic support from Hamish and Sophie Forsyth, Charles Holloway, the Britten Syndicate and The Royal Opera House Endowment Fund
The unique resonance of Venice in 1913 is the setting for Britten’s intense and
atmospheric opera about a burnt-out, middle-aged writer obsessed with youth while
haunted by death. David McVicar’s major new production is the first of two Britten
operas this Season, part of The Royal Opera’s ongoing Britten cycle, and features a
strong contingent of British artists, headed by Mark Padmore as the troubled
Aschenbach, with Gerald Finley in the multiple roles that persistently foreshadow
mortality. This is a real ensemble piece, with many individualized roles, and dance
integral to the story, not least in the form of the young man who is the focus of
Aschenbach’s disturbing desire. Mark Elder conducts Britten’s final opera, which
returns to The Royal Opera for the first time since 1992.
• Daphnée Laurendeau, Cai Glover, Alexander Ellison, Mickaël Spinnhirny
Performances:
21–24 November 2019
Linbury Theatre
Coppélia
The Royal Ballet
Choreography: Ninette de Valois after Lev Ivanov and Enrico Cecchetti
Music: Léo Delibes
Generous philanthropic support from Mrs Aline Foriel-Destezet (Production Principal),
John and Susan Burns, the Coppélia Production Syndicate and The Royal Opera
House Endowment Fund
Scenario: Charles Nuitter and Arthur Saint-Léon after E.T.A. Hoffmann
A classic ballet returns to the Royal Ballet repertory with Ninette de Valois’ charming
and funny Coppélia – a story of love, mischief and mechanical dolls. The intricate
choreography is set to Delibes’ delightful score and shows off the technical precision
and comedic timing of the whole Company. Osbert Lancaster’s designs bring a
colourful storybook world to life in this Christmas treat for the whole family.
Creative team
• Designer: Osbert Lancaster
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• Lighting designer: John B. Read
• Conductors: Barry Wordsworth, Tom Seligman
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Performances:
28 November 2019–7 January 2020
Main Stage
Live cinema relay: Tuesday 10 December
The Lost Thing
World premiere, The Royal Opera
Co-production and co-commission with Candoco Dance Company. Based on the book
by Shaun Tan.
Generous philanthropic support from the Paul Hamlyn Education Fund
What is it… and where does it belong? The discovery of something mysterious and
out of place is the starting point for this new family show. Experience a musical
reimagining of Shaun Tan’s beautifully illustrated book about a boy who helps a lost
thing find its way home. In this enchanting collaboration between Candoco Dance
Company and The Royal Opera, a cast of disabled and non-disabled singers, dancers
and musicians come together to tell a story about how we are all connected.
Creative team
• Composer: Jules Maxwell • Director and choreographer: Ben Wright • Dramaturg: Jude Christian • Set and video designer: Will Holt • Costume designer: Rike Zöllner
Performances: 7 December 2019–4 January 2020 Linbury Theatre Sung in English
Otello
The Royal Opera
Music: Giuseppe Verdi
Libretto: Arrigo Boito
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Position of Music Director Maestro Antonio Pappano generously supported by
Mrs Susan A. Olde OBE
Generous philanthropic support from Marina Hobson OBE, Spindrift Al Swaidi and
The Royal Opera House Endowment Fund
Verdi’s Shakespeare-inspired penultimate opera charts the fall of an all-powerful
leader and devoted husband from the radiance of power and love to the darkness of
deluded jealousy. Keith Warner’s insightful production, here in its first revival at the
Royal Opera House, highlights the conflict between innocence and evil at the heart
of Shakespeare’s story. Verdi’s score is one of his finest, ranging from grand
ceremonial scenes to episodes of exquisite intimacy. With supreme Verdians Gregory
Kunde (Otello), Ermonela Jaho (his beloved Desdemona) and Carlos Álvarez (his
nemesis Iago), conducted by Royal Opera Music Director Antonio Pappano, it’s hard
to imagine a more thrilling operatic experience.
Creative team
• Conductor: Antonio Pappano
• Director: Keith Warner
• Set designer: Boris Kudlička
• Costume designer: Kaspar Glarner
• Lighting designer: Bruno Poet
• Movement director: Michael Barry
Cast
• Otello: Gregory Kunde
• Desdemona: Ermonela Jaho
• Iago: Carlos Álvarez
Royal Opera Chorus
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Performances:
9–22 December 2019
Main Stage
Sung in Italian with English surtitles
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The Royal Opera returns to Japan in September 2019 for the first time since 2015.
Antonio Pappano will conduct Otello at NBS from September 14 to September 23 as
well as Faust from September 12 to September 22.
La traviata
The Royal Opera
Music: Giuseppe Verdi
Libretto: Francesco Maria Piave
Violetta – the ‘fallen woman’ of the title – is tested to extremes in one of the most
famous of all operas. Yet it is her extraordinary strength in self-sacrifice that has
engaged the hearts of audiences in this consistently popular opera. Verdi brought to
this powerful story, based on real-life characters, music that soars, elates and stirs,
and audiences have long been moved by it. The colour and detail of the Parisian
world of its story – from the glamour of its society parties to the poverty of Violetta’s
final hours – makes this a favourite among Royal Opera productions.
Creative team
• Conductors: Daniel Oren, Francesco Ivan Ciampa, Maurizio Benini
• Schaunard: Gyula Nagy, Alessio Arduini (Jan, Feb); Duncan Rock (May)
• Colline: Peter Kellner, Fernando Radó (Jan, Feb); Krzysztof Bączyk (May)
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Royal Opera Chorus
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Onegin
The Royal Ballet
Choreography: John Cranko
Music: Kurt-Heinz Stolze after Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky
Generous philanthropic support from Mrs Aline Foriel-Destezet (Production Principal),
Lindsay and Sarah Tomlinson and the Paul Ferguson Memorial Fund and the Friends
of Covent Garden
The naivety of first love gives way to the regret of experience in this narrative ballet
by British choreographer John Cranko. The atmosphere of Imperial Russia is brought
to the stage through the gripping story from Pushkin’s classic verse-novel, a score
drawn from across Tchaikovsky’s works and historically informed designs. Cranko’s
detailed choreography peoples the countryside and city settings with finely drawn
characters full of emotion. The Royal Ballet is at its dramatic finest in this heart-
breaking story of two people whose paths are fated to cross but never to join.
Creative team
Designer: Jürgen Rose after original 1969 designs for Stuttgart Ballet
Lighting designer: Steen Bjarke
Conductor: Valery Ovsyanikov
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Performances:
18 January–29 February 2020
Main Stage
Aisha and Abhaya
World premiere, Rambert
Co-production between The Royal Ballet and Rambert in association with BBC Films
and Robin Saunders.
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Generous philanthropic support from The Royal Opera House Endowment Fund
Aisha and Abhaya is a modern fairytale that combines stunning film with striking
choreography, performed by Rambert, Britain’s foremost contemporary dance
company. This co-production between The Royal Ballet, Rambert and BBC Films
is a feast for the senses. Director Kibwe Tavares brings together the work of
choreographer Sharon Eyal with music by Ori Lichtik and GAIKA. Beautifully lavish
costumes contrast with the heartbreaking story of two sisters in a new world and
their struggle to survive.
Creative team
• Director: Kibwe Tavares
• Choreography: Sharon Eyal
• Music: Ori Lichtik/GAIKA
• Choreography co-creator: Gai Behar
• Costume designer and style supervisor: Uldus Bakhtiozina
• Projection designer: Gillian Tan
• Visual effects: Factory Fifteen
Performances:
21 January–9 February 2020
Linbury Theatre
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground
New production, The Royal Opera
Co-production with Irish National Opera
Generous philanthropic support from Hamish and Sophie Forsyth, Charles Holloway,
Gonzalo and Maria Garcia and the Contemporary Music Circle
Music and libretto: Gerald Barry
Fun, furious, frantic and utterly fantastic! The surreal world of Lewis Carroll’s Alice, both in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, is given an extra twist in Gerald Barry’s operatic treatment. At less than an hour for the whole opera, this short, sharp shot of mayhem is ideal as a family treat. Antony McDonald (of last Season’s Hansel and Gretel) directs and designs this new production – the first ever staging of this musically virtuoso opera – with more than a touch of the Victorian
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toy theatre. The Red Queen, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter: meet a kaleidoscope of colourful characters in this joyful, headlong rush into a world gone deliciously mad.
• Red Queen, Queen of Hearts: Allison Cook, Clare Presland
• White Queen, Dormouse: Hilary Summers, Carole Wilson
• White King, White Rabbit, Mad Hatter: Sam Furness, Nicky Spence
• March Hare: Robert Murray, Peter Tantsits
• White Knight, Cheshire Cat, Mock Turtle: Stephen Richardson, Mark Stone
• Red Knight, Humpty Dumpty, King of Hearts: Joshua Bloom, Alan Ewing
Performances
4–9 February 2020
Main Stage
Sung in English (and other languages)
Acosta Danza Up Close
Acosta Danza
Produced by Valid Productions
Carlos Acosta’s own dance company is drawn from the best of Cuba’s dancers and performs a distinctive repertory that combines national and international flavours in
technique, choreography and music. As a Sadler’s Wells International Associate Company, Acosta Danza is no stranger to London, and on this occasion the company will be seen in a distinctive light through a programme of intimate works
whose scale and mood is perfectly attuned to the performing space of the Linbury
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Theatre.
Soledad
• Choreography and costume and set designer: Rafael Bonachela • Lighting designer: Lee Curran • Music: Chavela Vargas and Gidon Kremer (Hommage à Piazzolla)
Impronta
• Choreography: Maria Rovira
• Costume designer: Zeleidy Crespo • Lighting designer: Pedro Benitez • Music: José V. Gavilondo
El Cruce Sobre el Niagara
• Choreography: Marianela Boán
• Costume designer: Leandro Soto
• Lighting designer: Carlos Repilado
• Music: Olivier Messiaen
Two
• Choreography and costume designer: Russell Maliphant
• Lighting designer: Michael Hulls
• Music: Andy Cowton
New Work
• Choreography: Juliano Nunes
Performances:
14–24 February 2020
Linbury Theatre
New Cathy Marston/New Liam Scarlett
World premieres, The Royal Ballet
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Liam Scarlett's role as Artist in Residence is generously supported by Ricki Gail and
Robert Conway
Cathy Marston is previously an Associate Artist of the Royal Opera House and
Director of Bern Ballet, and much in demand internationally. The inspiration for her
first work for The Royal Ballet Main Stage is the momentous life and career of the
cellist Jacqueline du Pré. A new work by Liam Scarlett, The Royal Ballet’s Artist in
Residence, provides the second part of the programme.
New Cathy Marston
• Choreography: Cathy Marston • Scenario: Cathy Marston and Edward Kemp
• Music: Philip Feeney • Set designer: Hildegard Bechtler • Costume designer: Bregje van Balen
• Lighting designer: Jon Clark • Conductor: Andrea Molino
New Liam Scarlett
Choreography: Liam Scarlett
Performances:
17 February–4 March 2020
Main Stage
Live cinema relay: Tuesday 25 February 2020
Susanna
New production, The Royal Opera
Co-production with London Handel Festival. Generously made possible by
Oak Foundation.
Music: George Frideric Handel
Libretto: Anonymous, based on Apocrypha, The History of Susanna
Performed by: Jette Parker Young Artists
A virtuous woman wrongly accused by two men with ulterior motives provides the
dramatic core of Handel’s oratorio Susanna. It was written for Covent Garden and
had its premiere on the site in 1749 but hasn’t been performed here since. Now it
receives a staging in the Linbury Theatre led by members of the Jette Parker Young
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Artists Programme. The production is part of our Handel series and follows on from
Solomon and Berenice. The beautiful score is full of Handel’s subtle musical
dramatizations, from arias to powerful choruses. This is a wonderful opportunity to
rediscover the past through a work of Covent Garden heritage and to see talented
rising artists who will become the stars of the future.
Creative team
• Conductor: Patrick Milne • Director: Isabelle Kettle
Cast
• Susanna: Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha • Joacim: Patrick Terry • Daniel: Yaritza Véliz
• Attendant: April Koyejo • Chelsias and Judge: Michael Mofidian • First Elder: Andrés Presno
• Second Elder: Blaise Malaba
Performances
5–14 March 2020
Linbury Theatre
Sung in English
Fidelio
New production, The Royal Opera
Music: Ludwig van Beethoven
Libretto: Joseph Sonnleithner, Stephan von Breuning and George Friedrich
Treitschke
Position of Music Director Maestro Antonio Pappano generously supported by
Mrs Susan A. Olde OBE
Generous philanthropic support from Marina Hobson OBE, Martin and Jane Houston,
Mary Ellen Johnson and Richard Karl Goeltz and the Maestro’s Circle
Beethoven’s only opera is a masterpiece, an uplifting story of risk and triumph. In
this new production, conducted by Antonio Pappano, Jonas Kaufmann plays the
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political prisoner Florestan, and Lise Davidsen his wife Leonore (disguised as
‘Fidelio’) who daringly sets out to rescue him. Set in strong counterpoint are the
ingredients of domestic intrigue, determined love and the cruelty of an oppressive
regime. The music is transcendent throughout and includes the famous Act I
Quartet, the Prisoners’ Chorus and Florestan’s impassioned Act II cry in the darkness
and vision of hope. Tobias Kratzer’s new staging brings together the dark reality of
the French Revolutionary ‘Terror’ and our own time to illuminate Fidelio’s inspiring
message of shared humanity.
Creative team
• Conductor: Antonio Pappano • Director: Tobias Kratzer
• Set and costume designer: Rainer Sellmaier • Lighting designer: Michael Bauer • Video designer: Manuel Braun
• Dramaturg: Bettina Bartz
Cast
• Leonore (Fidelio): Lise Davidsen • Florestan: Jonas Kaufmann
• Rocco: Georg Zeppenfeld • Don Pizarro: Simon Neal • Marzelline: Amanda Forsythe
• Jaquino: Robin Tritschler
Performances:
1–17 March 2020
Main Stage
Live cinema relay: Tuesday 17 March 2020
Sung in German with English surtitles
Swan Lake
The Royal Ballet
Production supported by OANDA
Liam Scarlett’s role as Artist in Residence is generously supported by Ricki Gail and
Robert Conway
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Generous philanthropic support from Lindsay and Sarah Tomlinson, John and Susan
Burns, Kenneth and Susan Green, Doug and Ceri King, the Fonteyn Circle and
The Royal Opera House Endowment Fund
Choreography: Liam Scarlett after Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov
Music: Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky
Liam Scarlett’s glorious production of Swan Lake, new in 2018, returns for its first
revival. While remaining faithful to the Marius Petipa/Lev Ivanov text, Scarlett’s
additional choreography and John Macfarlane’s magnificent designs breathe new life
into what is arguably the best-known and most-loved classical ballet. The entire
Company shines in this eternal tale of doomed love, a masterpiece refreshed for a
new generation. Tchaikovsky’s first score for ballet soars with its symphonic sweep
and combines perfectly with exquisite choreography, from the grand pas de deux of
Prince Siegfried and Odile to the swans at the lakeside. An intoxicating mix of
spectacle and intimate passion, the overall effect is irresistible.
Creative team
• Choreographer: Liam Scarlett
• Additional choreography: Frederick Ashton • Production: Liam Scarlett • Designer: John Macfarlane
• Lighting designer: David Finn • Conductor: Koen Kessels
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House/Royal Ballet Sinfonia
Performances:
5 March–16 May 2020
Main Stage
Live cinema relay, Wednesday 1 April 2020
Draft Works
The Royal Ballet and guest companies
Drawing together companies of international renown, this year’s International Draft
Works programme continues the opportunity in London to see the direction
choreography is taking globally. A series of new works explore the artistic potential
of movement. The intimacy of the Linbury Theatre allows you to see up close the
work of choreographers at the forefront of dance development, and the dancers with
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whom they collaborate. This is a programme about the choreographic cutting edge –
encouraging new ideas and giving insights into rising talent.
Performances:
19–24 March 2020
Linbury Theatre
Jenůfa
New production, The Royal Opera
Generous philanthropic support from Hamish and Sophie Forsyth
Music and libretto: Leoš Janáček
The third in The Royal Opera’s stagings of Janáček, Jenůfa explores the lives of two
courageous women struggling for fulfilment in a small rural community. Janáček
movingly captures Jenůfa’s progression from hope to despair to eventual radiant
happiness, while her stepmother, the Kostelnička, is one of opera’s most complex
and sympathetic maternal figures. Award-winning director Claus Guth stages the
first production of Jenůfa at Covent Garden since 2001. Former Music Director of
Glyndebourne Vladimir Jurowski conducts a stunning score infused with the folk
music of Janáček’s native Moravia, with rising star Asmik Grigorian as Jenůfa and
Karita Mattila as the Kostelnička.
Creative team:
• Conductor: Vladimir Jurowski
• Director: Claus Guth • Set designer: Michael Levine • Costume designer: Gesine Völlm